03-Goldkrone Investigation
by Fahiru
Summary: There are things that even the puppet master cannot plan for, and a few stray strings will easily tangle with leads they were never meant to cross.


**03-Goldkrone Investigation**

 **by Fahiru**

I must admit that a small part of me seems to die as I begin to fill these new pages with old ink, my last journal still unfinished, but it would be difficult to keep track of paperwork if I were to mix business and curiosity with personal matters. And this is a personal matter, though I am loathe to say it. Yes, that even a steady intellectual such as myself could ever be driven by anything of personal interest rather than a higher cause has always bothered me, and yet this may turn to be a public service in the end.

My name, though it cannot be fully disclosed for safety reasons, is Autor; and this afternoon I discovered that my world is not real.

I will try to recount the events as they happened, but though serious I am not lacking in an imagination that may befuddle details from time to time. The setting of this anomaly is my hometown, Goldkrone, in western Bavaria. It had always seemed to me a very ordinary place, with nothing to its name but some old ruins, a rather advanced school of the arts, and the old house of a famous author. I've never thought much of the town itself, and yet it rarely occurred to me that I should ever leave. There were times when it would appear dull and stifling, but then, almost without thought, my mind would dismiss this with an odd endearment and quickly move on to the next matter of business. I was never one for big dreams and yet- yet I could never be at peace when ever I chanced to look upon the city wall.

But today, today that has all changed.

I was reading an old, crumbling fairytale in the back of an old bookstore. I would have never picked it out myself had the clerk not been about to throw it out. I've always had an odd, almost impulsive affinity for unwanted things. I suppose I have my own solitude and near invisible nature to thank for that. I don't catch much attention, but I notice nearly everything. That was my first clue, the book itself was only the second- although it caused me to find the first.

Although it was an amusing story, it did not make much of an impression until there was an animal that spoke- and it surprised the main character. My first thought was that the hero was incompetent, but my mind, though it was painful to focus, caught on the notion that animals rarely speak in stories. But the fact of the matter is, they speak here, in this town, and it never made me so much as bat an eyelash. Why shouldn't they speak? I thought this was some barbaric sort of prejudice being implanted in me, before I thought to look into a few books on animal anatomy, particularly in the vocal chords.

Animals, with the exception of some varieties of well trained birds, are unable to pronounce the sounds that make up human language. Not German or English or Latin, they are barred from it. And yet, I have heard them speaking nearly everyday. I thought of how awkwardly their mouths shaped the words, how there was something odd and a bit ventriloquistic in their voices. Furthermore, the animals here wear clothing, yet this almost never occurs in natural stories or historical accounts. You don't hear of generals that are bears and kings that are lions unless it's a metaphor.

It was then that I realized I had always had these things before me, yet had never questioned them. Even now, as I write these impossible words, you will see that my pen begins to quiver on the page and sweat has begun to fall from my brow. It is- it is truly difficult to focus on reality, to not let my mind be swept away in the current, in the blissful thoughts of a distracted scholar who cannot see the wall before his nose. have to think, I must practice my scales- no, my mind has already begun to wander. I have drawn blood now from my tongue, but the pain sharpens my concentration.

And my thought is this: something is actively distracting my consciousness. I notice small details and forgotten things, ad yet I have failed to notice that even my mind cannot wander beyond the walls of this town. I've heard the world is round, but quickly as mentioned we will move on to cover commerce and business. Has there ever been a map of this world? Not that I have ever seen. For all I know, this is the only reality, that all books tell lies and conspiracies and the world is really as small as these five gates that will not open. I never thought that animals should not talk, and yet as I question it my mind has begun to assume that the idea of them being mute is the real fairytale. Even now, my thoughts betray me, and I am faced with this: Gates are meant to lead somewhere, yet I have never heard of a land beyond this. There is a vague awareness that there must be something else(travelers, peddlers, performers have all come and gone) beyond what I have known, yet I cannot think of what. Whatever blocks my mind is crafty, for it never dismisses ideas with a stark "no" which would raise suspicion, but quietly acknowledges the thought before beginning to segue into a more distracted thought, as if the former had no real importance. But it can no longer stop me, not since I have realized that I live in Bavaria but do not know what that means, that I enjoy a variety of musicians without the slightest inkling as to where "Italy" actually is. These informational gaps have caused quite the headache, and at the time I nearly lost the thought while stumbling out of the book shop; I regained it again because I wandered right into the yard of the most historically significant building in all of Goldkrone: The home of Herr Drosselmeyer, the Demon Author.

In that moment, there was almost a voiceless sort of chuckle that invaded my head, and then all the barriers were gone.

Nothing is Real.

And my mind was opened.

I see now that the one thing I never thought of before today was who this author really was. I went to read his stories, but the endings were torn out of every copy. I knew enough of the town's lore, however, to see patterns.

Everything I ever read that had happened in his books have happened in this town. I thought at first that he was really just a historian, until I looked up the dates of the incidents and the publishing of his stories. Each one occurred within three years after the corresponding book was published. He was either writing prophecies, or-

My mind begins to ache again. It seems I cannot think as clearly here as I could at the site of his home. I will try again later, but my tongue is still bleeding and I had best tend to that now.

Further investigation will be conducted and recorded as soon as possible.

-end entry-


End file.
